My Conversation with the Iron Lady of Africa

Ellen Johnson Sirleaf has had quite a year. In October she won the Nobel Peace Prize. Tomorrow she will likely be announced the winner of Liberia’s presidential runoff election, giving her a second five-year term. (She was elected Africa’s first female democratically chosen head of state back in 2005.)

Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf (Photo: Jason Margolis)

I had the opportunity to meet Sirleaf last summer when I was on a two-week reporting trip in Liberia. We had a wide-ranging 30-minute discussion about how the Liberian government, and she herself, could rebuild the country after a 14-year civil war. Make no mistake, it hasn’t been easy to pick up the shattered pieces. Take the example of Kakata, a rural village I happened to pass thru on my way to the country’s interior.

A few years ago, Sirleaf held a big event in Kakata on Liberian Independence Day, where she symbolically, and mechanically, flipped a switch to restore power to the war-ravaged community. Within 24 hours, locals had climbed the utility poles and stripped the wires of their copper. The war mentality pervades: Take what you can, when you can. I asked Sirleaf how she felt about Kakata, and how she can possibly succeed in rebuilding her country when stuff like this happens?

“It’s a big problem – and it comes from so many years of depravation, dependency, dishonesty – that people just learn to survive by their wits, whichever way they could. It’s now part of the value system. The only way we can fight that is to continue to change people’s attitudes, to provide them opportunities to earn by working, put work ethics back,” said Sirleaf.

Kakata was far from an isolated incident. For example, Liberians routinely dig up sewer covers to get at the steel rods.

“That is perhaps the greater tragedy of the war,” said Sirleaf. “It’s not the physical destruction, but what happened to the value system and the culture. That’s our biggest war right now, our biggest fight.”

Pothole in downtown Monrovia (Photo: Jason Margolis)

The destruction and disrepair I saw in Liberia were at a level I’d never seen, and I’ve spent quite a bit of time in some poor parts of the developing world. Cars negotiate potholes 50-feet in length thru downtown Monrovia. Trucks lay in ditches by the side of the road for months, only “removed” when locals have completely stripped them of everything of value. The once-grand Liberian executive mansion, the physical and symbolic home of the president, remains empty since an electrical fire in 2006.

Or, consider this last anecdote…. As I was waiting for my interview with President Sirleaf, I used the restroom outside of her press secretary’s office. The toilets were old, rusted and filthy. The “sinks” were simply large garbage cans were filled with water. This set-up was common in other government bathrooms I visited.

So while Sirleaf and her supporters can rejoice in their likely victory that could be announced tomorrow, the job she has before her will undoubtedly continue to be daunting. It already is. Even before the votes have been tallied, her main opponent, Winston Tubman, said he might seek the annulment of the election claiming fraud.